Approximately a full year ago at the Vegas Grand Prix, the Cadillac racing team were ultimately awarded the go-ahead as the world of Formula One's latest participant for 2026. Establishing the team from scratch has involved a frenetic pace of work that the principal, Graeme Lowdon, has compared to the Apollo program. As the sport descends on Vegas this race weekend, the team know the deadline is approaching.
The Tight Timeline to Melbourne
At the season finale of the championship to be staged in the United States, with just over a hundred days to go before they make their debut for the first time in Melbourne at the 2026 opener, Cadillac have advanced rapidly but, in what must seem like a sisyphean endeavor, they are cognizant there will not be adequate time.
The technical director, Nick Chester, became part of the nascent team in the spring of 2023 soon after it was formed, when the squad were without even an approved entry. He has been at its core from that point and has a wry smile when reflecting on the ride.
“You can have five minutes reflecting at what you’ve done and go: ‘Amazing, how impressive what the team has created in less than three years,’” he says. “But then the next minute you think: ‘Well, there is still quite a lot to do.’”
An Unprecedented Task
Nick Chester achieved victories at the Renault team in the driver Fernando Alonso's championship-winning years of 2005/2006 and was in control of technical development at the new Mercedes-Benz Formula E team, but no other project has quite compared with the task of bringing the all-American Cadillac brand, a works entry supported by the parent company, General Motors, into Formula One.
“Creating an F1 team from scratch, when will you ever have the possibility to do that?” Chester remarks. “There's nothing comparable. In an well-set team you won't have the possibility to alter team culture.”
With each day that elapses thoughts are sharper on the impending critical moment in the Australian GP and targets are being managed.
“One must presume that a brand-new squad entering the sport is going to be last but simply getting on to the grid will be an feat in itself,” Lowdon noted this year and while the CTO echoed this he believed the team had a reputation to build as well.
“The first thing we aim to demonstrate is that we belong on the grid,” he says. “So we turn up and we perform competently. We seek to prove that this is a professional operation performing the correct procedures on the race track. After we prove that we are a legitimate team, then we aim to demonstrate progression from there on.”
Driver Lineup and Recruitment Drive
In late summer they signed Sergio Pérez and Bottas as their pilots for the 2026 season, a duo distinguished for their vast knowledge in operating at the front in two top-tier teams, Red Bull and Mercedes, and Bottas expressed the sentiment of combative optimism.
“Certainly, we are pragmatic,” he said. “We have a massive task to do, and it’s going to be probably a challenging beginning, because this is Formula One. But our goal isn't to stay at the back. I am confident given this organization, with this group, these personnel, there is every reason that we won't be able to progress rapidly up to the pace and enjoy some success.”
To achieve that goal recruitment has been in top gear, with employees now up to in excess of 400 and scheduled to attain the objective of 600 members swiftly. Complementing their current base at the UK base, the squad are in the midst of finishing an main base at the Fishers location in the Indianapolis area and there is the General Motors facility in North Carolina, where they are developing the facility to build the 2029 engine, planned for 2029 – in the meantime they will run Ferrari engines – and the aerodynamic facility in Cologne. It is a sophisticated organisation, at odds with the direction in Formula One for increased consolidation, and has prompted the innovative team culture to which Nick Chester alluded.
Apollo Model
“It’s highly modelled on the Apollo program,” said the team principal ahead of the Silverstone race in mid-season. “We are pragmatic, we understand how challenging it is. The schedules, are incredibly tight. OK, we aren't launching a lunar mission, but the pressure is comparable.”
So they have embraced, instead of the conventional chain of command, a flat management structure comparable to that of NASA's, where there were a assortment of project teams all focusing on distinct elements of the mission at a variety of locations.
“When you must follow a procedure where an issue arises and they raise it up to their team leader, that leader talks to a manager at a different location, it is relayed back, it becomes inefficient,” explains Nick Chester. “Therefore we enable team members to really get on with it. Avoiding managerial sign-off for all decisions is far more efficient and faster.”
Upcoming Challenges
The success of this flexible strategy will be proven in the pressure of racing next season and there is a significant degree at stake for Formula One, too. The Cadillac team have signed as their test driver the 25-year-old American Colton Herta
